A Damn Fine Espresso: March 2024

It’s the weekend before the Big Mama, the White Whale, the movie awards to end all movie awards: the Oscars. Who will win the Academy Awards 2024? Will Christopher Nolan And Cillian Murphy explode with the metaphorical force of a thousand suns? Will Barbie get what it can, in spite of the snubs for its director and star? What about Poor Things, Killers of the Flower Moon, Maestro, The Holdovers – or the European dark horses Anatomy of a Fall and The Zone of Interest? Join Sam and Matt as they discuss their own Oscar thoughts: who was snubbed? Who was nominated but shouldn’t have been? And which films should win which awards?

For more discussion of some of the 2024 Oscar favourites and underdogs, make sure to check out these posts:

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I’ll be in my trailer… watching trailers: Biting, isn’t it?

Join us every week for a trip into the weird and wonderful world of trailers. Whether it’s the first teaser for the latest instalment in your favourite franchise, an obscure preview for a strange indie darling, whether it’s good, bad, ugly or just plain weird – your favourite pop culture baristas are there to tell you what they think.

From Adams to Addams: Sam took this week’s Six Damn Fine Degrees to dark, dark places – namely boarding school.

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A Damn Fine Espresso: August 2023

What’s giddy, grim, and black and white and pink all over? You’ve guessed it: just when the discourse has died down, A Damn Fine Cup of Culture goes all Barbenheimer on y’all. Join Alan and Matt as they talk about their impression of the memetic phenomenon of 2023 and discuss Greta Gerwig’s ultra-meta toy ad Barbie and Christopher Nolan’s ultra-Nolany drama Oppenheimer. Just why did these two films capture audiences’ imaginations to the degree that they have? Does Oppenheimer escape the traps of conventional biopics? Does Barbie manage to find a good balance between comedy, drama and message movie? And what other films should be combined into similarly striking (or strikingly mismatched) double bills?

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